Monday, October 8, 2012

My dad and my husband both woke up at roughly the crack of dawn to go run the St. George marathon. I woke up a little bit when I heard them walk out of our hotel room door, and then I got stressed about mortality, was suddenly wide awake, and couldn't go back to sleep. Because, marathons are really long and a really big deal. And because, what if there was some sort of freak accident on the road, or if one of their hearts burst or something?

So I just spent most of my morning hanging out and contemplating being a 21 year old orphan (the more correct term would be bastard, but I feel awkward writing that) (too late) and/or widow, and probably I could get some sort of book deal out of that, because that's pretty abnormal, but I would probably be too sad to actually write a book about it.

And so then I finished J.K. Rowling's new book The Casual Vacancy. And, shoot. It was a rough read. I'm still deciding whether or not I'm glad I read it, but for now just know that I do not recommend it if you are already in a sensitive state of mind. Drug use, domestic abuse, rape, psychological disorders, bullying, breakups, social injustice. It's all there, and it's all super sad. It was a little bit of a political statement by old J.K. about welfare and poverty, I think. A very effective and disturbing statement. Go Jo?

So then I got ready for the day and drove myself over to the marathon finish line, hoping that my dad and husband were both still alive and I would get to see them cross the finish line alive and not have to claim their bodies somewhere on a stretcher. (Spoiler alert: they live.)

Something you should know is that if you already are feeling ambivalent about someone's mortality is that you should not watch elite runners crossing a marathon finish line. These people looked very emaciated and exhausted, and I was really concerned about their tiny legs making it all the way to the finish line. Some people were so done they literally stumbled across the finish line and then collapsed. One guys fell to his knees directly in front of me and started crawling. And his arms and legs and face were contorted and spazzing. All I could think of was the LDS video where Jesus cures the guy with the palsy. This man looked like the guy with the palsy.

Obviously I embarrassingly started visibly weeping and everyone around me was totally freaked out. But then, not too long later, I saw my really cute husband running toward me (I mean, the finish line). AND, he did not only did not look emaciated or near death, he actually looked AWESOME and was running normally and quickly. He was killing it. I was so overcome with relief and love and joy that I started screaming, "ROBBY!" "ROBBY!" "ROBBY ROBBY ROBBY ROBBY ROBBY!" And then the announcer said "Robby Meldau, from Phoenix, Arizona" and I was like "WOOHOOOOOO! ROBBBBBBBYYYYYYYY!"

But he did not hear me at all. At. All. And I was like up against the fence really close to him. I could have touched him. Everyone around me started laughing and I sprinted off to the other side of the finish line to go talk to him. But I couldn't find him. I spent what felt like eternity squinting at every runner in a white shirt in the special runners-only free ice cream area (Seriously, after the finish line, there was the area where only runners could go and they were just handing out a million different types of ice-cream novelties and also oranges and stuff), but he wasn't there. I walked around the entire park looking for a runner in a white shirt that was passed out. No luck. I finally find him on the other side of the park, barely past the finish line, just chatting with his running buddies. Like, laughing and talking like a normal person. Then I see my dad cross the finish line, and then he just starts chatting with his running buddies. They are all just acting like what they did was totally NORMAL and it is not. And I was like Hi! Hello! Do you see me? You just ran a marathon! How are you alive? What are you doing? Why are you standing up?

And they were like "Heeeeey! Good to see you! How long have you been here?"

And I was like, I SAW YOU FINISH. I'VE BEEN HERE ALL MORNING. YOU COULD HAVE DIED!

Then, they make their way out of the special runners-only ice cream area, we take a picture, then later we go get hamburgers.

What a day.

POSTEDIT: I originally just wrote for my 750 words writing because it was a funny experience to me. After you submit your writing it will give you "stats" on what you wrote like. Here was today's:

Tuesday, October 2, 2012

Do you ever have those times in your life where you just can't seem to catch a break? Because right now is one of those times for me. I woke up last week with a cold and for a few days I felt just absolutely awful--like I had been run over by a steamroller (body aches), then swallowed some nails (scratchy throat), then consumed a million Otter Pops so I had perma-brain freeze (congestion). So yeah, I may have been overreacting, but it was rough, and that's just the kind of person I am (dramatic). I still feel kind of sick, but I also feel like I can function in society again, so that's good.

I remember when I woke up with the smallest symptoms of a cold, thinking "This is probably just the adversary trying to weaken me because I've been doing good things lately". And guess what, guys? DO NOT TEMPT FATE BY THINKING THAT. Since then, a variety of things have just been happening to me that are either making me sad, driving me crazy, or just plain annoying me. And it's frankly getting kind of old.

All in all I've just been kind of generally annoyed with life and myself and everything has felt kind of stale. But guess what? According to F. Scott Fitzgerald,

So I'm going to roll with that. Even though I live in Arizona and the weather doesn't get "crisp" until approximately January, I still am going to act on this alleged seasonal change. I've got the best husband in the world, a great job, lots of people who support me, and a little bit of ambition.

So here are my goals. Hopefully, by the end of October I will have decided whether or not I want to pursue a Master's degree (and what I want to pursue it in, and I will have applied/taken the GRE) and I will be able to run four miles straight like I used to, and I will write something every day. I found this really great website called 750words.com. It is what it sounds like--you log in and write 750 words (which adds up to three pages) of private, unfiltered writing. And it gives you points if you meet the 750 word mark! I've been experimenting with it for a few weeks, and I signed a pledge to write on it every day in October.

Because I really like to write, and I want to get better at it. Writing privately on that website has been really fun for me, but I also want to write publicly, because, you know, that's how you know if you want to make a job out of it. So, I guess the whole reason I'm writing this post is to say publicly that I hoping to blog semi-regularly in October, and I want you (Mom) to hold me up to it. Okay?